Being a Princess's friend
by giddyfan
Summary: When Caroline finds out her best friend DG is actually alive and living in the OZ she is thrilled. However, being friends with the princess is more complicated then she originally thought. Please r&r. I don't own Tin Man
1. Chapter 1

Author's Note: This story is rated M but this chapter is T. This is my first Tin Man fic. There are two references in this chapter. The first person who reviews my story and gets the guesses right will get a treat from me. I don't own Tin Man. Please r&r. Enjoy.

My head is pounding really hard. I try to remember what happened. That's right there was an extra powerful tornado and I couldn't get in the cellar in time. I feel the sun on my eyelids and slowly open my eyes. I see men with guns pointing at me.

"Who are you?" one of the men asks.

"I'm Caroline. Who the hell are you?" I ask them.

They put their guns away and the one who spoke earlier says, "We got a slipper."

"Where am I?" I ask. They help me up and start leading me somewhere.

"You're in the O.Z and were taking you to see the princess," one of the men answers my question. I must have hit my head harder than I thought. Although most of the time my dreams aren't this tactile. I look up and see two suns shining in the sky. I am definitely not dreaming because this is all too real. After walking for hours we come upon a huge city surrounded by a wall. Checking in with the guard at the city entrance we head for the castle that is the focal point of the city.

"This is central city," one of the guards explains to me before I can ask. We enter the castle and the head guard goes away to get the princess.

I am looking at the intricate design of the castle when I hear, "I hear you found another slipper." I freeze and the guards around me bow. I know that voice but, it can't be. I turn around and see my best friend who disappeared a few months ago standing a little distance away.

"DG?" I ask still in shock.

"Caroline?" DG ask with a smile. DG runs up to me and gives me a huge hug.

"I can't believe it's really you," I exclaim.

"I can't believe you're here too," DG says.

"We have a lot to catch up on," I tell her.

"Guards its ok I will take care of this one personally," DG instructs them. They bow and then disperse. DG and I link hands like we did when we were little girls and she leads me upstairs to her room. Her bedroom is as big as my kitchen and family room at home combined not including the balcony, closet, and attached bathroom.

"Wow," I comment.

"Yeah and this was the smaller option," DG informs me. We giggle as we both hop on her bed.

"So tell me everything," I say.

"And then together Az and I saved the OZ," DG finishes. I am completely laying on the bed and DG is propped up on one elbow next to me.

It is silent for a few seconds before I say, "I don't know what to say to that."

"Caroline speechless, this is a first," DG teases me. Before I can respond there is a knocking on the door. "Who is it?" DG yells.

"Princess, one of the guards told me you had taken a special interest in a slipper. Is she in there with you?" the voice on the other side of the door asks. DG turns to me and whispers "Cain," one of the men that helped DG save the OZ. From the way she talked about him, she fancies him quite a lot.

"Yes Cain you can come in," DG replies to his question. I sit at the edge of the bed like DG is now doing. She is in between me and the opening door. An older man walks into the room. His white shirt with brown vest and khaki like pants told me he wasn't a man who was going to be messed with when angry. The gun in his holster told me if I did mess with him I would pay for it. He stops walking towards us about halfway. I get up off the bed and walk towards him. As I walk around him he doesn't move but follows me with his eyes. His blue eyes are lighter than DG's and his blond hair is cut short but still visible under the fedora. I come back to his front and we are staring at each other.

"Cristo," I say. He looks confused and looks at DG for clarification. After a moment he looks back at me. DG probably shook her head or shrugged her shoulders as a response to his look. I smile at him and turn back to face DG. "Well you've certainly found your Han Solo," I tease her. She blushes as I sit back beside her.

"Caroline stop it," she says.

"Princess what is going on?" Cain asks.

"This is Caroline my best friend from the other side. She was just making sure you were a good person. She did it with all of my friends back on the other side," DG explains. Cain looks me over. I know what he is probably thinking. Is this girl with long straight brown hair and green eyes a threat to the princess's life? Before he makes some sarcastic comment I decide to see just how he is going to react to me.

"I've heard a lot about you Mr. Cain," I tell him. He narrows his eyes at me.

"Princess you know you're supposed to tell me when you are doing things like meeting with slippers," Cain declares.

"Why don't you to do that? To see if I am dangerous?" I ask Cain.

"Yes," Cain replies firmly.

I smile and say, "I am dangerous, just not to DG."

"How are you dangerous?" Cain asks doubting me.

"I know how to handle myself in a fight Mr. Cain," I remark.

"Caroline use to fight for me at school," DG interjects.

"Those were mostly the argumentative ones though," I put in. It is silent for a moment.

"Would you like to meet everyone else?" DG asks me.

"Absolutely," I exclaim. DG and I walk out of the room and I hear Cain follow. As we are strolling down the hall we come across a young woman.

"Az the slipper that they told me about just happened to be my friend Caroline," DG starts. "Caroline this is my sister Azkadelia." I notice that she called me her friend and not best friend. I suspect this is so her sister doesn't feel bad and I am ok with it. I don't bow to her but Azkadelia doesn't seem to mind.

"It's very nice to meet you," Azkadelia comments. She has a sweet smile and it is hard to imagine her being possessed by the witch. Her light blue dress is simple on the dress part but the top part has intricate lace patterns.

"It's great to meet you too, Azkadelia," I return.

"Please call me Az."

"Your dress is very pretty," I compliment her.

"Thank you. Are you sure you're DG's friend?" I laugh a little before saying,

"Yeah even though I do all the fighting, I was still more of a girl then she was." Az smiles again.

"Do you know where Glitch and Raw are?" DG asks Az.

"There in the lab with Ambrose's brain," Az tells us.

"Great we'll see you later," DG says pulling me along. The three of us hurry along and enter a room with a big door. There is a strange looking creature and a man with a zipper in his head at the far side of the room. We all go over and the creature who I know is Raw stops what he is doing. He and Glitch turn towards us. "Raw, Glitch this is my best friend from the other side Caroline," DG introduces. I shake Glitch's hand and smile with a nod at Raw. Glitch notices Cain in the background.

"Is there something wrong Cain?" Glitch asks.

"He's watching me because I told him I can fight. He thinks I'm dangerous," I explain to Glitch.

"Well let's have Raw take a look at you. If that's ok with both of you?" Glitch proposes.

"That's fine with me," I confirm. Raw steps up and takes my arm.

"Overwhelmed," Raw says. I nod my head. "Happy to see DG," Raw continues. I smile at DG. "Good person, good fighter," Raw finishes and lets go of my arm.

"You see Cain there is nothing to worry about," DG tells Cain. Cain walks up so he is now with the rest of the group.

"I'll even prove it," I say. I turn to Glitch and tell him, "Punch me."

"What?" Glitch asks. I roll my eyes.

"Punch me," I repeat. He goes in for the hit and I block him easily. He tries a different angle and I block him using my other arm. I give him a signal to stop. "The fighting that I do is mostly about bringing my opponent down with a few hits to key places like pressure points in the body," I explain. Everyone is staring at me. DG is the only one who doesn't look shocked.

"So all we have to do is meet my parents now," DG says.

"Great," I exclaim enthusiastically. We grab hands and leave the boys contemplating what happened. When we get to her mother's office door there is a guard there.

"We would like to see my mother," DG tells the guard. The guard goes inside the door and comes back a little bit later.

"You may go in," the guard announces to us. We go in and at the end of the room is a desk. At the desk is a woman with lavender eyes and a man who looks (to me) a little scruffy. We stop just in front of the desk.

"Mother and father this is one of my good friends from the other side Caroline. She happened to slip over here during a storm," DG explains. I bow to the queen and her consort (that's what she called it).

"Welcome Caroline it is nice to know my angel had such a lovely friend while on the other side," the queen says.

"Thank you your majesty," I reply.

"Mother could she stay here for a little bit please?" DG begs. I smile remembering her begging her robo-parents to let me sleep over when we were young.

"Alright but only for at most a week," the queen answers.

"Thank you your majesty," I thank her. DG grabs my hand and pulls me back to her room. Once in her room DG starts going over all the things she wants to show me.

"DG what is up with you and Cain?" I ask interrupting her.

"What do you mean? Nothing is up," DG answers. I roll my eyes at her.

"Come on I know you like him," I remark.

DG blushes and replies, "He is like twelve years older than me and that doesn't count the time he was in the suit. His son is the same age as us."

"Love doesn't have an age restriction," I say to her.

"I don't know if he is totally over his wife's death yet," DG comes up with another excuse.

"He is if the way he looks at you and his protectiveness over you counts for anything," I provide. DG looks down at her hands. "

If you don't do something about it I will and you know what happened last time that happened," I tell her. She nods saying she knows I mean business. We talk and giggle for the rest of the night until we fall asleep.


	2. Chapter 2

Author's Note: Thanks for all you readers who stuck with my story. This chapter is rated M. Pleas r&r. I don't own Tin Man.

On one of my last days in the castle DG and I are sitting on her bed talking about her plans for tonight.

"So I asked him if we could have final meal in the library just me and him and he said yes," DG tells me.

"That's great. Even if he doesn't think this is a date you guys still get to spend some alone time together," I say. We go out to the garden which has become my favorite spot in the castle. All the pretty flowers and plants that don't grow in Kansas are amazing. "What are you going to wear?" I ask DG.

"I was thinking I would put on some darker colored pants and maybe a lighter colored shirt so he doesn't suspect it is a date," DG answers.

"Blah, blah, blah. Do girls ever stop talking?" a voice says from behind us. DG and I turn around and see five men approaching us.

"Zero!" DG growls at the lead man.

"DG go back to the castle and get Cain," I say to her not taking my eyes off the men.

"But," DG starts to say.

"Go!" I shout at her. DG runs back to the castle and one of the men (longcoats DG called them) tries to go after her. I quickly turn to him and kick him in the shin making him fall to the ground. I'm glad that when I came over I was wearing my hiking boots that I have on now.

"Well who do we have here?" Zero asks me.

"Caroline. I'm a friend of DG from the other side," I tell him.

"How can a pathetic girl like you possible hope to defeat us?" Zero proposes.

"All I hear is talk. You know we have a saying on the other side 'You can talk the talk but can you walk the walk'" I tell him. The other three men start coming at me at Zero's command. I knee one of them in the groin, the second one I hit in the forehead with the heel of my hand and the last one I hit with a karate chop to the throat. I hear a loud noise and feel a pain in my foot. I fall down and see that Zero has shot my left foot. They start kicking me in the side.

Right before I black out I hear, "Take her instead, we don't have enough time to look for the princess."

*(DG POV)*

Cain is running ahead of me as fast as he can. I could only get out a few words when I found him because I was running so hard.

I think I got out, "Caroline, Zero, and garden." We get to the garden but there is no sign of her. Cain kneels to the ground looking at something.

"There's blood here," Cain says.

"They've got her," I interpret. We go a little ways farther and find a note. Cain reads it out loud,

"If you ever want to see the princess's friend again make sure Cain comes to his old house alone, Zero." We stand there look at the note for a moment. Cain crunches the note.

"They were planning on taking you. Why didn't you have a guard with you?" Cain asks almost yelling at me.

"That's not important right now," I reply.

"Of course it's important. You're important to me," Cain remarks back. I am shocked at what he has just said. Cain realizes then what he has confessed. I grab his vest and pull him down. Our lips meet and the flame ignites and burns powerfully. I however, pull away before I want to.

"We can continue this later. Right now we have to find Caroline," I whisper. I start walking back to the palace.

"Wait there will be no 'we'. I have to go alone remember," Cain says walking with me.

"I have to go with you," I practically demand.

"Why? What is wrong?" Cain asks me. I take a deep breath.

"One of the reasons that Caroline and I became friends was because we both wanted to get out of Kansas but couldn't. Except her reasons were much more concrete. Her father used to beat her up. If she didn't get perfect grades in school, if she wore something he thought was slutty, anything would set him off," I explain. I pause to keep myself from crying. "She would sleep over at my house as much as she could to avoid him. That's why she learned how to fight so it wouldn't be as bad. She use to come to school with cuts and bruises," I finish. Cain puts a hand on my shoulder.

"Alright let's go," Cain says.

*(Back to Caroline's POV)*

I wake up groggy and in pain. Before I open my eyes I use my other senses to figure out where I am. I hear Zero and the other longcoats walking around and talking. I can also get that my hands are tied behind my back. I finally open my eyes and see that I am in a rundown cabin.

"Oh good your awake," Zero says. I look and see that he is standing right in front of me.

"Why are you doing this?" I ask him.

"Well I was planning to take the princess but you interfered," Zero tells me.

"That doesn't answer my question," I say. He hits me in the face hard. My lip is bleeding now.

"Cain cares about the princess and will do anything for her," Zero explains.

"So this is all about beating Cain," I interpret.

"Beating and breaking him until he wishes he was dead," Zero remarks.

"It won't work. He has beaten you time and time again. What makes you think this time will be different?" I say. Zero hits me again harder this time.

"You're a feisty one aren't you?" Zero asks. The way he said that sends a shiver down my spine and fills me with a panic I hadn't felt in a while. Zero forces me into a position where I am on my hands and knees. He kicks my legs far apart.

"Stop!" I yell tears threatening to come out. He pulls down my pants and underwear. I cry out desperately tear flowing freely now.

Zero takes down his pants and is about to rape me when we hear someone call out, "Zero you coward come out here." Zero growls, fixes himself as well as me which somewhat surprises me. He hits me one more time before going out the front door. I breathe a shaky unsteady sigh of relief. I knew I wasn't out of it yet but was glad for the distraction.

"Cain and the young princess, I'm glad you could make it," I hear Zero say.

"Where's Caroline?" I hear DG yell at him. Some longcoat grabs me and drags me out. He throws me and I land a little ahead of Zero. "Caroline," DG cries. Cain prevents her from running to me. I look at Cain and we one of those weird almost telepathic moments that people have. I nod and catch his barely nod back.

I look at DG and say, "I'm alright." The longcoat who hauled me out kicks me in the side.

"Here's how it's going to work. Cain you will surrender to me and I will let the princess and her friend go," Zero proposes.

"Don't do it," I shout. The longcoat kicks me again and I hope I haven't broken a rib.

"Do you really think I am going to fall for that, Zero? The second I surrender you'll capture all three of us," Cain says.

"You're right," Zero replies. Three of the longcoats go after Cain while the one near me stays to guard me. Zero just watches. While Cain is dealing with those three, DG comes over near me. DG punches the longcoat and he is out cold.

"How did you do that?" I ask her hearing a gun shot in the background, knowing it is Cain.

"I guess I put a little magic in it," DG explains. I hear the click of a gun near us as DG finishes untying me. We look up and see Zero aiming a gun at DG. I try to cover DG with my body. We hear a gun go off. I look at DG and she shakes her head. We look up and Zero falls next to us dead. Cain's gun is pointed where Zero was standing. Cain and DG both help me up. I am hurting all over and know there will be bruises. We get to the horses and I stop.

"I can ride on my own as long as we don't go too fast," I insist.

When Cain starts to protest DG says, "Caroline is a champion horseback rider back in Kansas." Cain looks at me surprised.

"Learn anything to help you get away," I say. Tears threaten to come out as the memories come forward. DG gently hugs me so as not to hurt me. It is little but helps me immensely. After Cain helps me up on the horse and gets on the other one with DG we start off. The ride back is painful but is lessened when I see DG in Cain's arms. When we get back to the castle it is dark.

"DG, my angel are you all right?" the queen asks her daughter.

"Yes mom I'm fine," DG says hugging her mother. Everybody is here. The queen, her consort, Az, Raw and Glitch. DG hugs the rest of her family and friends while Cain helps me off the horse. I hit the ground a little too hard and grab my side where the longcoats kicked me. DG comes rushing back over to me.

"Raw will you help?" DG asks Raw. He nods and they lead me to DG's room.

"Raw heal injuries. Bruising remains," Raw says after healing me. I pull up my shirt and see a huge bruise where they kicked me.

"Thanks Raw," I thank him. The queen comes up to stand next to DG who is kneeling next to the bed.

"I want to thank you for defending my angel," the queen says to me.

"I'm used to it from our years together. Although this is more physical than before," I tell her.

"Would you consider a job in the Royal Guard?" the queen asks me. DG had told me that's what they call the army here.

"I'd have to be taught to shoot a gun," I inform her.

"I'm sure Jeb will be glad to teach you," DG says to me.

"Ok but I think we should wait until this bruise is gone," I accept.

"Excellent. I hope you recover quickly," the queen says and leaves. Glitch gives me a smile and squeezes me hand as a thank you. He and Raw leave then.

"Thank you for saving my sister. Not just this time but for all the years on the other side," Az thanks me.

"The truth is that she has saved me just as many times as I have saved her," I say squeezing my hand which now has DG's in it. Az nods and leaves the room. Now it is just DG and Cain with me in the room. "I hope your son is as stubborn as you are Mr. Cain because if he isn't I don't think we're get along," I joke.

"Then you should get along famously," Cain puts right back.

"Does this mean I will get to see you sometimes DG?" I ask her.

"Yeah I guess," DG answers. I smile real big at that. Life here is starting to look good.

A week later…

There is a knock on the door.

"Come in," DG calls. We are in DG's room talking. A young man in an army (excuse me Royal Guard) uniform comes through the door. His light brown hair is swiped back. His eyes have a familiar blue color. "Hey Jeb," DG greets.

"Hey DG," Jeb greets back. So this is Cain's son? I see only a little bit of his father in Jeb looks wise. But I hear they have many arguments because they have the same stubborn personality.

"Jeb this is my friend from Kansas, Caroline," DG introduces us. I shake Jeb's hand.

"You're the girl who fought off the longcoats to save DG?" Jeb asks.

"Oh, he doubts me! You're not teaching me to fight, you're teaching me to shoot," I say. Jeb gives me a strange look.

"I think you've met you match, Jeb," DG remarks.

"Yeah like you're my father's match?" Jeb asks DG. DG blushes.

"Come on let's go. See you later Deeg," I say. My life here just got a whole lot more interesting.


End file.
